House Panel Approves Farm Labor Reform – November 22, 2019

House panel approves farm labor reform, floor vote ‘soon’

The House will vote soon on a bipartisan bill to provide legal status to undocumented farmworkers and to modernize the H-2A agricultural guestworker program — the first agricultural labor reform bill in three decades, said sponsor Rep. Zoe Lofgren.

Cellulosic ethanol continues to flow at first Iowa plant to produce it

Even as larger-scale producers of cellulosic ethanol shutter their plants, a handful of small-volume producers are staying the course. One of them, northwestern Iowa’s Quad County Corn Processors, has been using its distinctive distilling method to make cellulosic ethanol since 2014.

Michigan law calls for cage-free eggs by 2025

Under a law signed on Thursday, Michigan will become the largest egg-producing state to require farmers to switch to cage-free egg production. The Humane Society of the United States said the decision “shows just how rapidly American views on the treatment of farm animals are evolving.”

TODAY’S QUICK HITS

Another suit against McD’s (Bloomberg): Current and former McDonald’s workers in Illinois are suing the company, charging it does not adequately protect employees from customers who become violent.

Farmers still suffering from a wet season (New York Times): The effects of the wettest year on record are still being felt by farmers in the Midwest, where delayed planting and soaked soil could become the norm as climate change makes for more extreme weather.

EPA weakens safety rules for fertilizers (Washington Post): The EPA weakened a rule, adopted after a fertilizer depot exploded and killed 15 people in Texas, that governs the steps companies must take to prevent accidents, including how they store dangerous chemicals.

Time stands still for Thanksgiving dinner (AFBF): The ingredients for a classic Thanksgiving dinner for 10, including turkey, cranberries, and pumpkin pie, cost only 1 cent more than they did last year, according to a survey of grocery store prices.

Small farms given short shrift on tariff payments (EWG): Ten percent of farmers, “the largest, most profitable industrial-scale farms in the country,” have received half of the billions of dollars in trade war payments from the Trump administration.